Fiftieth Theory [Voice/Action for Housemates]

[i_speak_softly]

[When Don opens the door to the storage room, he immediately forgets what he went there for. His housemates will hear him shouting:]

No!

[Later, when he's calmer, a Voice post:]

Derek Bliss has gone home.

[... That's all he can manage.]

Comments

[slaying]

H-home?

[ the vampire slayer -- a compatriot, a colleague, a comrade -- can hear her own voice shake. derek is the man she went to when other men went home. who, then, could help her shoulder this loss?

don't cry don't cry don't cry. ]

Are you sure? He didn't just...maybe he's in the caves again. Donatello. I'll check the caves. I have to check the caves

[i_speak_softly]

Buffy... all his things are gone.

[Part of Don wants to believe that Derek snuck into the house and carried away all his possessions, but - it's just too implausible. The man is gone.]

[slaying]

I'll check anyway.

[ stubborn. she will not lose him. ]

[i_speak_softly]

Please find him...

[As though Buffy could do so by sheer determination in searching. Then again, if anyone could shift reality through force of will, the Slayer could.]

[slaying]

I will. I want to -- I hope to. I, God...

[ there is the sound of shuffling things. of getting ready. ]

[i_speak_softly]

[Don will let her go - but he'll be watching that connection, hoping she reports back.]

[slaying]

[ sadly, she won't be.

roll out the grieving songs. ]